Different
by jojospn
Summary: Everything is different and yet everything is the same. MAJOR spoilers for 11x23, "Alpha and Omega." Fair warning.


**A/N: MAJOR spoilers for the season finale, "Alpha and Omega." As always, I don't own** _ **Supernatural,**_ **just borrowing the boys.**

 **Different**

Sam Winchester will never get used to burying his brother.

A part of him dies with Dean every time, slow and agonizing, all encompassing. He's drowning, air rushing from his lungs and suffocating him. It matters not that he has seen him die on more than one occasion, only to miraculously return. Each time hurts as much as the last, and will remain as such until the day he finally breathes his last.

When Sam first loses Dean, on a warm, spring night in New Harmony, Indiana, he out of his mind with grief. He buries his brother with the hopes (no, _intention_ ) of bringing him back, somehow. He stops at nothing, from attempting demon deals of his own to teaming up with one of Hell's foul creatures, turning to the bottle for comfort. He allows himself to be manipulated in his fragile emotional state, a marionette dancing erratically, controlled by Ruby. And it is for nothing; it is Castiel who ultimately saves Dean, and Sam's descent into Hell on Earth has been for naught.

The next time Sam loses Dean, he gives up. He knows he should have never; there was no body, only a spatter of black goo on the walls and Crowley's confirmation that his brother is gone and that Sam is "well and truly" on his own. He turns to the comfort of a woman, the companionship of a faithful dog, and the normalcy of living a life of a civilian. Deep down, he knows that Amelia's touch feels wrong; that the affectionate licks of a loving pet on war worn hands do little to comfort. And yet he continues to live a lie, a false sense of domesticity, one that he had unintentionally condemned Dean to two years earlier. One again he is a puppet, this time for a grieving widow using him; again, he willingly allows himself to be manipulated, seeking as much comfort in her as she does for him.

The third time Sam loses Dean, he is right there, holding him in surprisingly steady arms as his brother dies. He remembers how Dean's body trembles slightly as he draws one last, unsteady breath before collapsing lifelessly in his arms. Though he has carried the weight of his brother on many other occasions, this time he feels heavy as Sam draws him away, fingers desperately searching for a pulse; he feels heavy as he pulls him closer, cradling his big brother in his arms as he sobs. _It's like Cold Oak,_ he thinks to himself, _I died in Dean's arms and now he died in mine…_ This time, however, is different. He saves his brother, not from the dead, but from himself. _Dean_ is the puppet this time, and Sam knows all too well the consequences. He will do whatever it takes to bring him back, to rid his brother of the Mark he is burdened with.

And now, Sam loses Dean one final time. He tries to tell himself that this time will be like the others. He accepts the keys to the Impala telling himself that by day's end they will once more be in the pocket of its rightful owner; he jests about breaking chick flick moments and melts into his brother's embrace, telling himself that this is not goodbye. As he gently kisses his finger and touches his mother's headstone, he almost convinces himself that there will not be a new monument resting there. There can't be. He's lost and found his brother so many times… in fact, this macabre dance with death the Winchesters have played for the past eleven years could almost pass as comical. But this time is different. There are no supernatural beings to bring Dean back, Billie has made certain to that. There will be no body to bury: his brother was a human bomb for chrissakes.

Everything is different.

Sam watches as the perpetual sunset brightens to midday sunshine and feels his breath hitching. The others somberly celebrate: the Darkness is vanquished, the world once more settling comfortably in oblivion, unaware of just how close they have come to total annihilation, or of the sacrifice Dean Winchester has just made. They will continue leading their mundane lives, going to work, raising families, worshiping their gods, not once suspecting that their own God had come so close to extinction. _How dare they act so normal?_ Sam selfishly thinks. _To act like nothing has happened when my brother…_

His thought trails off as he feels a gentle hand pat him on the shoulder. It's Cas and Sam remembers that he is not the only one grieving his brother. He turns and he sees the sorrow in his friend's eyes, the one who loved Dean almost as much as he. The angel says nothing, but Sam immediately understands. He pulls out the Impala's keys, the weight of them in his palm almost too much. Drawing a shaky breath, Sam nods and wordlessly heads to the Impala, sliding behind the wheel as Cas settles in the passenger seat. He grasps the wheel in unsteady hands and remembers the first time he's been in the driver's seat eight years earlier. It had felt so different then, the rough texture of the wheel, the warmth of the leather on a seat that was still adjusted to Dean's height. It's like that right now, and as Sam slides the bench backwards, he decides that not much has changed this time around.

Everything the same.

He knows that this time, there is no do over. Dean is dead and this time, nothing will change that. The ache, the emptiness, the _loneliness…_ It doesn't matter how often he's lost his brother; it doesn't matter that this time, there is nothing he can do to bring him back. Sam will return to an empty bunker, to the smell of gun oil and cheap cologne lingering in his brother's room. To the empty pizza boxes and the bottle of unfinished beer setting on the counter and the lore books left open to the last page Dean has looked at. Sam closes his eyes, blocking the horrible images of normalcy from his mind, before jamming the keys to his brother's car in the ignition. He turns to the angel riding shotgun, nodding his head in grim determination even as fresh tears trickle gently along his cheek.

"Let's go, Cas," Sam says.


End file.
